Do you want to add tables in WordPress posts and pages? Tables are a great way to display data in an understandable format.
In the past, you needed to use a plugin or HTML code to create a table in a WordPress post or page.
In this article, we’ll show you how to create tables in WordPress posts and pages without using a plugin or any HTML code. We’ll also cover how to create advanced tables in WordPress with sorting and search features.
Video Tutorial
If you’d prefer written instructions, just keep reading.
Creating Tables in the WordPress Block Editor
WordPress makes it super easy to add tables using the default WordPress block editor.
Simply create a new post or page, or edit an existing one. Once inside the content editor, click on the (+) symbol to add a new block, then select ‘Table’.
You can find it under the ‘Formatting’ section ,or you can type ‘Table’ into the ‘Search for a block’ bar.
Next, you’ll be prompted to choose how many columns and rows you want for your table. Both figures default to 2.
Don’t worry if you’re not 100% about the exact count because you can always add/remove table columns and rows later.
We’ve created a table with 3 columns and 4 rows:
You can type in the table cells, and they’ll automatically resize depending on how much content is in each. If you’d prefer your cells to be fixed-width, then you can set this option on the right-hand side.
You can also add a table header or footer section here. In our example, we have added a header for our table, and we have also set the background color to gray under the ‘Color Settings’ tab.
If you want to add a new row or column, just click on a cell at the point in the table where you want to add it. Next, click the ‘Edit Table’ button.
Here, we’re adding a new column on the right hand side of our table:
You can also delete rows and columns in the same way. Just click on a cell in the row or column you want to remove, and select ‘Delete Row’ or ‘Delete Column’ from the ‘Edit Table’ menu.
By default, the text in your table’s columns is aligned to the left. You can change this by clicking in a column and then clicking the ‘Change Column Alignment’ button:
Here, we’ve applied center alignment to the three columns that have numbers:
You can also change the alignment of your whole table within the post or page by clicking the ‘Change alignment’ button and selecting an option from the list.
Note that these options can make your table display beyond the normal boundaries of your post area. Some may look odd on your site, so please make sure to preview your post or page to check how they appear.
Here’s our table set to ‘Wide Width’ as it appears on the site:
As you can see, it stretches out beyond the left and right margins of the post area.
The table tools built into the Gutenberg editor give you a lot of flexibility about how you display your tables.
You can use it to show your data to readers in an easy to understand format. However the table block doesn’t have certain advanced features like search filtering, custom sorting, etc.
It also doesn’t let you easily use the same table across multiple areas of your website such as sidebar widgets or other pages.
To create advanced tables, you need to use a WordPress table plugin.
Creating Tables Using the TablePress Plugin
TablePress is the best WordPress tables plugin on the market. It is 100% free, and it allows you to easily create and manage tables.
The best thing is that you can edit your table separately and even add a large number of rows.
TablePress also becomes necessary, if you are using the older classic WordPress editor which does not come with tables functionality.
First, you need to install and activate the TablePress plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
You’ll then see a TablePress menu item in your WordPress dashboard. Go to TablePress » Add New to create a new table.
You’ll need to type in a name for your table and decide how many rows and columns you want. You can always add / remove table rows and columns later as well.
We’re going to create a table with 4 rows and 3 columns:
Once you have added the table name, rows, and columns, go ahead and click the ‘Add Table’ button to create your table.
Next, you’ll see a screen with your table’s information and an area where you can add content.
Simply type the data you want into the cells of your table. You can sort the columns of data using the arrows above them. These will sort in alphabetical or numerical order.
There are advanced options below the ‘Table Content’ area. In ‘Table Manipulation’, you can do things like adding, removing, and duplicating rows:
In ‘Table Options’, you can add a header and/or footer row, which won’t be sorted in with the data. You can also decide where to show the table name and description:
Finally, you can set various options in the ‘Features of the DataTables JavaScript library’ section. This allows you to create responsive tables that can be filtered, searched, and sorted by your readers.
Once you’re happy with your table, click ‘Save Changes’.
You can add your table to any post or page. Simply add the shortcode to a paragraph block or use the shortcode block.
If you’re using the classic editor, then simply add the shortcode straight into your post:
If you want to change your table in the future, you can come back to TablePress in your dashboard and make changes. Your table will be automatically updated in any posts and pages you’ve used it in.
TablePress also allows you to import data from spreadsheets and CSV files. Similarly, you can also export a TablePress table data into a CSV file which you can then open with any spreadsheet program like Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets.
We hope this article helped you learn how to add tables in WordPress posts and pages without using HTML. You might also like our post on how to create an email newsletter, and how to make a contact form in WordPress.
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Yemi says
Is there a way to break the long table into pages whereby users can click next
WPBeginner Support says
To separate the content in your tables into different pages, you want to use TablePress and its pagination options.
Admin
Anita says
The background colors don’t work because you need to backspace the quotations and type in your own quotations. I found it by accident. If someone else has already figured that out my apologies but I wasn’t going to go through over 100 comments to check.
WPBeginner Support says
Thank you for sharing that should someone run into the background color not working for them
Admin
Andre Victor says
Hi. I have an existing table with data of 6 columns and 750 rows. It would be difficult to re-type into blank table in WordPress page. Please advise how I can either import the entire table (can be Excel or Word) or copy and paste the cells’ contents into blank table.
WPBeginner Support says
You would want to take a look at TablePress and the import options available to bring in your table.
Admin
Margaret says
Hi! I am wondering if it is possible to simply copy->paste a table from an existing document into WordPress? I have tried this and it doesn’t appear to work, but I am wondering if there is a trick to it that I am missing. Thanks!
WPBeginner Support says
It would depend on the document but we would normally recommend recreating the table in WordPress
Admin
Nicole says
Hi! I want to learn more about WordPress!!
WPBeginner Support says
Our site should be able to help you then
Admin
Jim Gharib says
Classic editor does have table functionality and a plugin is not needed when using that editor. Check it out.
WPBeginner Support says
You would need to use a plugin to enable the classic editor and normally that would require using HTML
Admin
Matthews Otalike says
Oh my word, thanks for the guidance on creating tables on WordPress and other resources you have been availing to us. Kudos to you.
WPBeginner Support says
You’re welcome, glad our guide was helpful
Admin
TheFrugalChoice says
Helpful post that I can use in my personal finance and financial independence blog.
WPBeginner Support says
Thank you
Admin
Monique Robinson says
Great article and great plugin. Straight and to the point. Thanks very much.
WPBeginner Support says
Glad you liked our article
Admin
Annapurna agrawal says
Hi
I have installed the tablepress plugin.
i have issue for user capability. In the user role plugin, i haven’t granted permission to “edit_other_user_tables”. But my contributor user role can still edit other’s table and delete it as well.
How should i avoid access to other’s table?
WPBeginner Support says
You would want to reach out to TablePress to see if there is a built-in or recommended method for preventing editing of other tables.
Admin
Nabil Nawaz says
Great article.. how can we make parent child in this ? like 1st column’s 1st cell is parent cell and next to it we have information for it’s child info.. like three rows are need to be explained for that 1st cell next to it
sumit kumar gupta says
Sir when we click on the TablePress option in Visual editor then only list of table is showing in front of me. No Table creation option is available in Visual Editor. What should I do for create a new table in Post editor?
Wyce Ghiacy says
Thanks for the video.
What would you recommend to embed a formatted Excel sheet and collect data from registered WP users? (Like monthly usage reports, and the excel sheet also calculates the quarterly/yearly usage)
Louise Wooding says
HI
Thank you for the video. I have created my table and chose Insert Image in one of the cells. It did let me choose the image but it then entered the URL to it rather than the image itself. Have I missed out a step??
Thank you.
Louise
Tom Cullen says
Awesome Share, thank you!
Owolabi says
This is a nice article boss.
Thanks for sharing.
But I do have a question.
Is there no plugin I can install that can bring the insert table option into the icons on my wordpress post?
Thanks as I await a reply
Ravi Kanani says
I want to add a table of specification in which first column is same for all post and second column is different.
How can I add this type of table in post??
Susan Hawthorne says
It would be very nice if, in the article about TAblePress it said that you have to upgrade to a business plan to use a plugin!!!!!!!!!!!!
WPBeginner Support says
Hi Susan,
You are probably using WordPress.com. Please see our guide on the difference between self hosted WordPress.org vs free WordPress.com blog.
Admin
Barbara says
Is there any way to bold some lines of text in the table? Its all plain text, wish there was an easy way to add bold text
Abee says
just add an html text at the word
Michael Carter says
Actually, you can use CSS if you are ok with it. Use The words you want to emphasize …
banks dada says
Thanks a million for this plugin. All i needed was to prepare the list on excel and import it into wordpress.
Sweet and time saving tool.
Bless you guys for this piece
Sadha says
Hi, I would like to create links in the table that forward to another page and pass the row number through or any field from the row. How would I do this?
Options I can think of which are not straight forward
1) Use localStorage\sessionStorage
2) Pass the value in the URL but then the next page needs to read this on load – maybe not a bad idea ?
Molly Greger says
Wow! such a fantastic tool!! BUT: the colors are so pale I cant see a thing?? How can I change the colors fo rows/columns?
varalakshmi says
Thank you……This is helpful to me up to some extent. I satisfied with your post.
Alex Nicholson says
Think this only works for users of WordPress.org. Is there any similar guide for those like me who use WordPress.com especially where I can use a coloured background to the cells in a table?
Ray says
Hello
I was trying to make an interactive table similar to this that would use a query picking data from a database.
I am using wordpress with a mysql/phpmyadmin database.
My query works in phpmyadmin but does not show values in wordpress?
SELECT * FROM `MyTablename` WHERE 1
Do i need to use a list or print command or database name?
Jhon Carl says
I am having the same issue with you. Did you find a way to this already?
Carolyn says
I would definitely recommend this plugin. A reminder to blogger when moving from one hosting service to another: don’t forget to back up the tables. There’s no way to recover the data. And if you know how can you share the info.
Dimitar says
I recently was struggling to figure out how to add good-looking tables so this will be very helpful, thank you for publishing this.
WPBeginner Support says
You are welcome
Admin
Omar Khan says
How to create tables on tag/category page
Paco Gimenez says
Hi guys,
Thank you very much for support.
This tablepress is interesting.
I was looking a system to do something like that:
In i have a table with some information and colums. table1 for example.
I want when i press some region in my map, i can load an url, like /map#section
Can i do something like load same table in another order? by some colum o something? instead of click in a column, click in a region and load the same url but with the “#” of this table in the order required.
Thank you very much for support.
Ben K says
Thought about updating the screenshots on this article?
Divine says
Thanks WP. You guys are the best! 4.5stars
Arindam says
Thanks for the info. I was wondering if the shortcode will have any SEO value. Is it likely that a table displayed with a shortcode will appear in Google Featured Snippet?
Harindu Perera says
How to show grid lines in TablePress???
Lorraine says
Many thanks. This made things so clear.
Can Erik says
Great article. Thank you very much. Easy to install and understand to use. Cheers!
mangi khumakcham says
Good table plugin but not mobile friendly.
The table right side get clipped in mobile view.
Sany says
Hey
Can someone show me, how I can create dynamic table?
I am new to WordPress. I like to maintain a database of gadgets say phones. I want an interface for me as admin to enter the specs and a picture of the item. For users, they will have the option to filter by brand and also compare 2 or more of these gadgets in a table format. They should also query an item and see all the specs in a table format. Please advice as to how this can be easily managed or maybe you have an article already for this!?
thanks
Stephen Ainsworth says
Amazing people don’t know how to use
and have to use a plugin. Sigh.
Noman S Baranian says
That is nice thing to learn and gain.. nice blog
Thanks for this! Now, how do I... says
Please, other readers, don’t be to harsh with me (especially using the R word). I am very new to all of this and feel successful in creating my first table. Now, how do I change the look and feel of the text in the table? I am using it to link to materials contained further on the page and highlight important pieces.
a guy says
You need to use CSS. There’s a bit of a learning curve to all this (in your case, you might want to style the table, rows, table cells, paragraphs in table cells, links, hover effects etc etc), so only start if it’s really important.
Tablepress - warning says
I just lost a Table that I created using Tablepress. I don’t know how it was deleted, but I also just found out that there is no way to recover a deleted table. Since I don’t know how the table was deleted, I am worried about relying on Tablepress.
WPBeginner Support says
If you have a backup plugin in place then you can recover your table by restoring to an earlier backup.
We don’t think it is a plugin issue.
Admin
Lilli says
Great! Great! Just what I was looking for! Thanks a million
David says
Is it me or WordPress is retarded? I mean any WYSIWYG editor can do a table on the fly these days, but the biggest CMS can’t? I must be missing something here, but using a plugin or iframes is so much trouble for a simple table… I’ll code it myself.
Vituz Andersen says
David,- I am with you. I dont get it. My first HTML editor back in 1998 had tables…. how come it has become easy to make a CMS based website, but you cant make a table…. Hellooooooo!!
Mayur says
Hi David,
I initially wanted to code it in myself, but wordpress kept formatting my table all over the place. Is there a specific was to use HTML in a page?
Many Thanks
Sirje Koop Palmqvist says
I copied a table from Word into WordPress and the code is neat and clean. It works well. Now I want to try the same table with the FooTable plugin to make it responsive, althought it already is responsive in a way. Thought that a webdesigner keeps the material on the local computer anyway and thus can make changes in Word and replace the table in WP. This might be cheating but it works. Sirje
Radu says
TablePress is an amazing plugin.
Thank you for this post.
Actually today I downloaded it and already donated some money to their team.
Have a fantastic day everyone.
Emily says
Use it with FooTable to make it Responsive. They both support each other. Perfect!
Ernest says
Hi,
Is there any way to remove the table lines from showing?
Neal says
The problems with plugins like this is that if you ever abandon the plugin the content linked to that plugin is busted across your entire site.
While very slick plugin I try to minimize my database dependency on them as much as possible.
WPBeginner Support says
Neal, you are right about that. However, TablePress uses custom post types for tables. This means your tables are stored in the database even if you deactivate the plugin. You can still export the data.
Admin
Group Of Oceninfo says
Hello Wpbeginner Team,
Is it possible to call script in same way ?
For ex. I have 1000 different scripts for 500 different post.
I want to call 2 table in each post and in that table Want to run script not text so Is it possible to call two scripts in table ?
ore says
Thanks for this! what resources can I use to create a table in which my clients can log in and post the prices of items they want to either buy and sell and which remains visible to the public
Balaji says
Thanks for helping me find the plugin.
Rátkai Tamás says
I’m interested in adding a table to a form or page. So if a user goes to the page, he can add the Quantity in the cells and at the bottom of the form he can send the table to me.
Basically it would be a really simple order page without any payment options.